Baking with Captain Kirk
by Cumberbatch Critter
Summary: In which they are on shore leave, Spock finds baking cookies fascinating, and Kirk gets defensive of his baking skills. Fluff. Rated T only for a bit of guy talk. Again I say, fluff.


**Baking with Captain Kirk**

"I am _starving_!" Jim announced, clapping his hand to his stomach as it growled loudly in the silent kitchen.

Spock looked up at him from his crouched position in front of the stove. "These will take approximately two-point-three-seven minutes longer in the oven before they reach their optimal temperature."

On a strange stroke of bad luck, their entire crew had been put on leave for a time being. The _Enterprise_ was undergoing repairs, they had just gotten back from a seven month mission, and Kirk had thought it had been an acceptable time for a complete shut-down.

Spock rather disliked it.

He and Jim had been discussing plans while they had taken a space shuttle back to Earth. Spock hadn't realised that until... until after they had landed on Earth, to be most honest.

He blamed Jim for distracting him. The Captain knew full well that if he started to talk about exploring new planets, Spock would chime in. Someone had to crush the ridiculous notions that Kirk came up with and it was Spock's job at the first officer.

Jim had thought the whole ordeal rather funny, but rather than let Spock travel to Vulcan by himself, he had invited him back to his house in Iowa. To be honest, Spock had been rather surprised that Jim had a house of his own at all.

Jim had been bemoaning the fact that he had nothing to eat when he had gotten the notion to make cookies. Actual Earth cookies. Not the kind that were packaged in a tin. Not the kind that food processors spit out. Actual _homemade_ Earth cookies.

Spock had sighed, took out his PADD, and studiously ignored the human Captain.

That was, until later, when Spock found the undeniable scent of chocolate in the air and only then had he pursed his lips and looked up.

Jim had been covered in flour and sugar, both clinging to his standard black shirt like Trichvellian leeches. He licked chocolate off his fingers, arranging sphere-like shapes of dough on a cookie sheet.

"Cookies are flat," Spock had commented, "but yours are sphere-shaped. Is this what designates 'home-baked Earth cookies'?"

Kirk had given him a bewildered look before laughing. "No. No, look, they're just like this because you put this caramel candy in the middle. As it cooks, it melts the caramel and the cookie will spread out. And when it's finished, you have a delicious chocolate cookie with melty caramel on the inside."

It happened exactly as Kirk said.

As the cookies became warm from the heat in the oven, the caramel in the middle of the sphere melted. As the caramel melted, the cookie also spread, forming flat, round chocolate cookies.

"Fascinating..." Spock murmured, watching the cookies bake.

"It's an oven, not magic," Jim said, sounding amused.

"The logic is overall simple, yet it appears to have an air of impossibility until you watch it with your own eyes," Spock murmured.

He could practically feel Jim rolling his eyes. "I can't believe you've never seen cookies baked in an oven before."

"Vulcan did not have such objects."

"What, ovens? Or cookies?"

Just then, the timer on the stove went off. Spock stood fluidly and backed away, letting Jim take the cookie sheet from the oven.

"Cookies were not of overall importance to Vulcan. They are a very human creation. Besides, chocolate is an intoxicant for our species."

The cookie sheet clattered loudly onto the stove top and Spock looked first to make sure that the cookies had not fallen onto the floor and then to Jim.

"What is wrong?"

"An _intoxicant_?" Kirk asked, voice incredulous. "_Chocolate_?"

Spock regarded him evenly. "Yes. Sugar, to be precise, but chocolate also produces the same effect. Cinnamon is an aphrodisiac, to name another commonly unknown fact."

Kirk stared at him in disbelief and Spock, unsure what was expected, simply looked back at his PADD to continue his research on a new plant found during their latest visit to a planet.

"You get drunk off of sugar... and turned on because of cinnamon...?" Jim muttered.

"Yes," Spock replied without looking up.

"Why didn't you tell me the first bit _before_ I made _chocolate_ caramel cookies?"

"It was of no importance. I would have to eat a large quantity before it had an effect. That being said, I do not wish to try any of your cookies, anyway."

Jim paused before straightening up. "Well, I didn't want you to try them, anyway."

Spock's eyebrow rose. "If I were to hypothesise from your tone of voice, Captain, it seems as though your plan was, indeed, to have me try a cookie."

"I don't want you to. Especially not after you told me all the effects of this shit." Jim's voice was stubbornly even.

Spock sighed and looked up. "If it is so important, Captain, then I will try one of the cookies. Galaxies forbid that you should pout the entire duration of the next trip," he muttered, mostly under his breath.

"I don't pout and I don't want a drunk _or_ lusty Vulcan in my house!"

"There are no traces of cinnamon in these cookies." Spock took a cookie, took a bite of it. The cookie itself was still warm and chewy, the caramel inside at a higher temperature than he expected. He swallowed quickly as his tastebuds burned.

Jim laughed. "For all of your logic, you can be _stupid_ sometimes. Let them cool."

Spock, nostrils flaring, took the cookie back to the table, sat down, and returned to his PADD. After approximately one point two minutes, Spock hesitantly took another bite of the cookie. It was cooler and didn't burn the roof of his mouth.

It was... fine.

"Well?" Kirk asked.

Spock shrugged.

"... A shrug. What the hell does a _shrug_ mean?" Kirk demanded.

"It was merely acceptable."

"_Acceptable_? Wha-"

"I don't prefer sugar. Or chocolate. Or caramel," Spock said.

"Oh. Well. Yeah. Okay." Kirk rubbed the back of his head. "More for me!" he said cheerfully, picking up a cookie.

Spock rolled his eyes as Jim stuffed the entire cookie into his mouth.

It was going to be a long week of shore leave.

* * *

**Because Spock in a human environment, with Jim, with baking is so fluffy that it tries to rot my teeth like chocolate caramel sugar cookies.**

**Even though the chocolate/sugar/cinnamon thing isn't _entirely_ canon. Just a fluffy fic. :p**

**I do not own _Star Trek_. Thank you!**


End file.
